The Skies of Pern

by Anne McCaffrey

  “Of course,” Tagetarl replied with some heat. “I’m a MasterHarper. Which reminds me: where did you so handily assemble that crew of yours? One of the Halls?” There was something familiar about them that Tagetarl couldn’t place.

  “Here and there,” Pinch replied enigmatically but added with uncharacteristic candor, “Runners, a few of ’em are seafolk waiting for a ship, useful types. All vouched for, I assure you. Ran me ragged getting here in time. Quick over the roof, too.” He glanced outside. “Experienced with brushes … of all sorts.”

  Then he and Bista were out of the kitchen before Tagetarl could ask anything else. Bewildered by Pinch and the imminent threat to his Hall, Tagetarl looked around, wondering how he was going to break this news to Rosheen. Well, if he washed the cups and put them away, she wouldn’t know at first glance that there had been early morning visitors.

  Honshu Hold—2.9.31

  “Come, my dear Tai,” F’lessan said as she entered the kitchen area at Honshu, “we will eat—and get down to business.” He rose and came to meet her.

  She gave him a wary smile. He had a tendency to jump in different directions, as if he enjoyed catching her off balance. He probably did. She’d thought that, once Golanth had flown Zaranth, F’lessan would disengage from her, perhaps more kindly than others had. On the contrary, he had insisted that she remain at Honshu, that she choose a room as her own—though they mainly shared the large one he preferred, and had shown her every part of an installation that must have originally been designed to support a large population. She hadn’t known there were so many levels in the stone mountain. She loved the well-equipped machine and tool room, just off the ground level where the covered hulk of an Ancient’s sled was stored. The night of the Fireball, when so many displaced Monacans had found shelter at Honshu, had probably been the first time in centuries the Weyr-hold had been even half full.

  He encouraged her to talk about her interest in astronomy and managed to bring texts from the Archives that she was certain Master Esselin did not realize he had borrowed. He was very conscientious about returning them.

  “We’ve put it off long enough, I think!”

  A sparkle in his eye was all the warning she had before he swung her up in his arms and twirled around. She clung to his shoulders, not fearing that he would drop her, but so she had this excuse to touch him. She wasn’t yet accustomed to either his spontaneity or his preference for touching but she was learning to welcome them. His gray eyes echoed his smile. If she weren’t so familiar with the weather and worry lines on his face, she’d’ve thought him much younger than she knew him to be when he smiled like that. Such an open, merry smile!

  “Put what off?” she said, humoring his mood. He wanted to surprise her, that was certain.

  “It’s a beautiful clear night.” He paused tantalizingly, and then she knew what he meant and could not suppress a gasp of excitement. “Yes, tonight, my dear green, we can hook up the scope.”

  Tai couldn’t suppress her crow of delight. “You got a monitor!”

  “And the operating disks. Erragon copied them for us and supplied fresh blanks for the imager. He’s given us a search pattern to follow. As if we’d ever get enough exposures to do a thorough job.” His eyes flashed with determination. “All we need is the right one at the right time of night or piece of sky.”

  He was right, of course, she knew, but with his merry grin and wide-open eyes, it was as if he was somehow going to succeed despite the odds against it. His was a personality of great contrast. She was fascinated by it and rebuked herself that she had ever considered him shallow. Over the last few sevendays, she had seen how seriously he took responsibilities, exuding an optimism that could fire those around him, and how he never shirked tasks, like the Benini Hold planting, which he could have delegated to another rider. He was certainly not the casual reckless weyrbred lad Mirrim had described.

  “I can certainly help with the search patterns,” she said, noticing how easily he involved her in his schemes. “Erragon trusted me with comparisons and scannings.”

  “I’d prefer scanning just you, Tai m’dear,” he said, kissing the hollow in her throat; his teasing lips were warm against flesh still chilled from her trip between. “But we’ll have to show Erragon results from Honshu or he’ll insist on dragging you back to Cove Hold.”

  Slowly he let her down. She liked the feel of his body against hers; F’lessan was so vital, so energetic, so—alive! He did not release her entirely, affectionately looping one arm across her shoulders.

  “I also spent my day doing what Aivas used to call a refresher course,” he added with one of his mischievous grins. “I don’t think I paid as much attention to him the first time as I should have.”

  She noticed how his eyes darkened with the knowledge of wasted opportunity. She touched his cheek in a brief caress. “If only we all knew then what we know now.”

  “Ah, yes,” and his lips curved with a touch of bitterness.

  Once again she was amazed that F’lessan was willing to show his regrets. He always appeared so self-confident. Still feeling a little embarrassed by such intimacy, she caught sight of the steaming pot on the range.

  “You cooked?” And looked again. “That isn’t a Honshu pot.”

  “No,” and he chuckled, giving her a hug as he guided her to the range. “I stopped off at Sagassy’s hold on the way back. I’d some nails for them from Landing’s Smithcrafthall. She insisted that I take this as a delivery fee.” He shrugged. “Remind me to return the pot.”

  “I will,” she replied. “After I’m sure you’ve washed it properly.” She couldn’t resist teasing him as she picked up the wooden spoon to stir the stew. “Oh, you’ve nearly let it scorch!”

  “Then it’s hot enough to eat.”

  F’lessan pushed her out of the way, gesturing her to sit at the end of the table that she saw had been set for two, and began ladling the stew into the wide, deep bowls. Mirrim would never believe that F’lessan could be so useful. She pinched the bread loaf and it was fresh; there was a salad, too, as greens were beginning to flourish again along the coast. She poured wine from the skin into glasses while F’lessan brought heaped plates to the table.

  “Sagassy said that Riller, Jubb, and Sparling have all seen signs of felines creeping back into the valley,” he said. “They haven’t run a check for missing stock but the herds have been spooky lately.” He blew on his spoon to cool the gravy-soaked meat. “Those sharding creatures may be hunting on this side of the ridge again.”

  Eight families, gradually clearing enough land to grow essential crops as well as round up wild herdbeasts, had settled the valley that spread out north of Honshu. They protected their cluster of buildings and beastholds with dragon dung and firestone mash, the best deterrents for any pests in the south, apart from trundlebugs. Visiting dragons—and those staying at Honshu after the Fireball had added considerably to the perimeter—were encouraged to donate. Once the residues dried, there was little smell to aggravate human sensitivities, but what there was was sufficient to put off all but the hungriest predators.

  She and F’lessan had hunted there during their first week together. She and Zaranth had just missed catching one of the cloudy-coats that wore such valuable pelts. There was so much else to do that they hadn’t been able to take time to hunt felines again.

  “We’ll have to plan to swing round the holds’ borders and rediscourage the carnivores,” he said, breaking off a piece of bread and offering it to her before taking some for himself. “You’ve about finished curing the last pelts we got, haven’t you?”

  “Just about. Someone else must have pegged skins on the wall I’m using,” she said.

  “Probably. Hold records suggest they were self-sufficient.” He shook his head. “I’ve never understood what happened to the people who were doing so well here. Why they simply …” he spread out his hands in bewilderment, “… left?”

  She felt gravy on the corner of her mouth and u
sed a bit of the bread to remove it, right past her lips. “Plague?” Disease had wiped out so many holdings it was always the first guess.

  He shook his head. “No, no skeletons.”

  “Vermin would have scavenged the remains.”

  “Their effects were all neatly put away.”

  “As if they meant to return?” she asked, surprised, but then F’lessan had been researching the history of this weyrhold of his.

  “No, as if that was the way they took care of tools and equipment.” He gestured to the kitchen and the utensils visible on the work surfaces.

  “As they did in the workshop.” All the shelves and drawers fascinated Tai, the contents neatly packed away in oil or grease and the airless plastic envelopes that the Ancients had had. Even the flying machine—a sled, F’lessan called it—had been cocooned. She’d never had the opportunity to visit the Catherine Caves as F’lessan had, but he’d said that these weren’t thoroughly explored or emptied of treasures. Samples of the things the Ancients had used were on display at Landing, some still encased in the packing used for the voyage to the Rukbat system. She—and others—had puzzled over the use of some items. “Why would they leave such a beautiful place?”

  “Once this Pass is over, you may be sure I won’t leave,” he said resolutely. “As it is, I’m here more than I should be,” he added with that irrepressibly engaging grin she so enjoyed. “Eat up, my dear green.”

  “Shouldn’t have eaten so much,” he remarked twenty minutes later as she trudged behind him up the steep stairs to the observation room. He was panting, too, she noticed. “As well we don’t have to lug things all the way up these stairs. Only down one level when we get where we’re going.”

  F’lessan had explained the almost secretive design of Honshu’s observatory; not all the secrets, he’d said, grinning with a boyish delight, but Kenjo had made sure it was not readily accessible. The first challenge were the stairs that went up six levels inside Honshu’s cliff.

  “Does Golanth watch stars with you, too?” she asked. Zaranth affected to and never objected when Tai spent long hours on her green back, studying the night sky.

  “He pretends to be interested,” F’lessan said in a mock-soft voice, turning to grin down the metal spiral at her.

  I hope I will not hurt these things when I bring them to you so high up, Golanth said facetiously.

  “Golanth, you will carry them as carefully as fire-lizard eggs,” F’lessan said, his voice stern as he winked down at Tai. “When I found the place, it was a mess and outside most of the solar panels were fouled or missing. Worse than the Admin building.” He took a deep breath before the next step. “Golanth was very good about helping me repair and reinstall them. He doesn’t fit in the observatory, of course, but he’s good at encouraging me to work hard.” He chuckled as he plodded up several more steps, boots clanking on the metal. She could feel the climb pulling at her muscles. He went on. “Good thing the cylinder had been vacuum-wrapped—another point in my theory that they intended to come back!” She could see that he was using the handrail to pull him upward. Good idea! She followed his example. “So we cleaned and repaired the vents and solar panels, and let power build up. I’d the finder scope to use to see if the instrument still worked. It did.” He gave a deep sigh of satisfaction. “We’ll have to run a pointing recalibration but I’ve got the files for the stars we use. Once we’ve hooked up the computer and are sure it’s pointing accurately, we can proceed to search whatever part of the sky Erragon wants us to scan. The program makes it possible to shift the primary mirror. We’ll get pictures on the monitor and decide what to save.”

  He paused, taking in deep breaths before he started upward again. She wondered that he didn’t save his breath for the climb but F’lessan loved to talk and, since his voice was very pleasant to listen to, she didn’t mind. She didn’t usually have much to say.

  “Got the generator working, too, so we don’t have to limit solar panel use.” He had breath enough for a chuckle. “Mighty clever those Ancients were in harnessing renewable energy. When we told Aivas that we’d found the old machinery, I swear he almost laughed.”

  “Laughed?” It would never have occurred to Tai that Aivas had been endowed with a sense of humor. She nearly stumbled on the steps but caught herself on the handrail.

  “Oh, Aivas had a powerful sense of humor. You know the kind of pause that means someone’s laughing inside? Well, Aivas would pause, wait a beat, and go on with what he was saying. Piemur was sure Aivas laughed to himself in such beats, but Jancis was horrified by the mere suggestion of a machine that could laugh.”

  Tai couldn’t see his face but, though sometimes he made jokes about his Turns under Aivas’s supervision, his voice was tinged with a respect that he didn’t accord even his Weyrleaders. She’d been so young, fresh from Keroonian hills when her mother and father had come south to work at Landing, and painfully naïve. Told over and over what a splendid chance she was getting in a Landing education, she had concentrated on learning as much as she could to avoid disappointing anyone, including Aivas. She had never questioned anything then. Now, and in the presence of F’lessan, she felt able to ask.

  “Why would Aivas be amused that you had discovered this valuable instrument and a power generator?”

  “I suspect,” and F’lessan climbed a few more steps before answering, “because Kenjo had been very clever about so many things. Like saving fuel in sacks each trip down from the Yoko so he could fly the little plane he built. And using the stone-cutters far more extensively than any other colonist. Yet what a beautiful place he designed—although, come to think of it, his wife, Ita, was artistic and it’s likely she did the murals in the Hall and some of the tapestries.”

  “Here we are,” he said and she could hear the relief in his voice. Dragonriders were more accustomed to flying heights than climbing them.

  She didn’t mind showing that the narrow winding stairs had winded her. Her thighs felt heavy, and she had an ache in the calf of her left leg. She gave it a quick massage as he fiddled a key into the locked door they had climbed so high to reach.

  At first, Tai saw nothing but the smooth sides of the vertical shaft’s creamy rock, eerily lit from small guide lights. She could feel a light breeze sweeping upward, cooling legs, body, and even the sweat on her forehead, and then a door opened just above her eye level. F’lessan lifted himself through, for a moment blocking her view. He moved to one side and, in the light from the shaft, she saw more creamy rock. She clattered up the last few steps and walked into such a splendid space that she just stood, looking around in amazement. A large dark brooding mass dominated the center of a wooden floor.

  F’lessan pressed plates on one side of the door and lights blinked on, one by one, girdling the room about F’lessan’s height from the floor. She could also feel more fresh air circulating.

  As the lights came up, she saw the long barrel of Honshu’s telescope, thicker in circumference than she could have put her arms about, longer than F’lessan was tall. A U-shaped fork structure held the barrel and, as she got closer, she could see that the fork was itself supported by a heavy metal plate, attached to a metal turntable. This tilted arrangement was an equatorial mount entirely different from the up-down, left-right, alt-azimuth mounting that was appropriate for Cove Hold’s larger, skeletal type scope and its position near the equator. Honshu’s scope was a dull cream of a composite material, slightly longer at the front, with a blunt rear end that she knew sleekly enclosed the 620-millimeter reflecting mirror. Unlike the Cove Hold scope, where the mirror was clearly visible inside the supporting skeleton, this mirror was hidden within the opaque cylinder. Only the services connecting to the telescope revealed what else was inside. She could see cooling pipes and electrical cables feeding through the cylinder at its midpoint, which she knew led to the camera at the heart of the telescope. What she could identify as the finder scope was attached to the upper surface beside two other anonymous cylinders. The
Cove’s instrument—one of the Ancients’ classical Cassegrains—was half again as long as this one, having a one-meter lens, its optics based entirely around mirrors and enclosed in a light gray composite of some ancient material. Here, too, was a raised wooden floor, to keep vibrations from being transmitted to the telescope and to allow people to walk safely around while observing. Not that the sheer cliff to which the scope was attached would move: Cove Hold had a cement base on its rocky promontory, high above the sea.

  Tentatively, she approached the cylinder, saw the cover at the top and controlled her impatience to see it. She did, however, appreciate F’lessan’s proprietary feeling for the scope. That he was willing to share it with her was yet one more unexpected boon.

  “Now watch!” he said, holding up his left hand, grinning with anticipation. With the fingers of his right, he pressed more plates, diverting her from a closer inspection of telescope and mounting.

  She was startled when a crack appeared in the ceiling. She stepped back, close to him, as what had seemed to be solid rock shifted. Gears whirred and the halves dropped and spread slowly apart, continuing to sink down, out of the way, against the observatory dome, stopping just above the girdle of lights.

  “Full range,” F’lessan cried in a proud tone, gesturing to the opening created by the sliding roof. “Golly found the seam in the rock when we were repairing the solar panels. No rock has straight seams,” he said with a snort. “Took Jancis, Piemur, and me days to oil, repair, and get this working again.”

  Tai knew that she was gawking idiotically at the superb view of the southern night sky now visible. She gasped then, when two dark shadows stealthily loomed down into the opening.

  Us, said Zaranth and gave an audible chirp, well pleased with herself for scaring her rider. She had kept her eyes shut and now opened them, happily whirling green.